NCC2–Another Committee won’t do it

NCC2–Another Committee won’t do it

There have been calls for the formation of a second National Consultative Council (NCC2) to push for harmony and to resolve a whole laundry list of problems from the fractured education system to religious issues, corruption, broken institutions, and ugly politics.

There have been calls for the formation of a second National Consultative Council (NCC2) to push for harmony and to resolve a whole laundry list of problems from the fractured education system to religious issues, corruption, broken institutions, and ugly politics.

The original NCC, led by the late Tun Abdul Razak Hussein, was set up in the aftermath of the May 13, 1969 race riots. It came up with the Rukunegara, while the National Operations Council (NOC) formulated the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1971, ostensibly to eradicate poverty “irrespective of race” and to “eventually eliminate the identification of race with economic functions”, according to the Second Malaysia Plan (1971-1975).

Despite the apparently noble objectives of the NEP to reduce economic inequality, it has been abused to enrich the Malay elite while the poor across all ethnic groups remain poor. The Bumiputera in Sarawak for example, such as the Bidayuh, still lack tarred roads, schools and basic healthcare in their villages in Padawan in this day and age.

The Rukunegara may have helped with laying down a set of principles for all Malaysians, but it’s regrettable that current government leaders violate the Rukunegara’s exhortation of “a liberal approach“ to the country’s diverse cultural traditions by demonising liberalism.

So why do we want NCC2, when the achievements of the NCC are questionable and the NEP has contributed to most of our problems today i.e. racial discrimination and ethnic tensions? I understand the frustrations of those calling for NCC2.

There is a sense of hopelessness and even despair. We still struggle with racism and religious conflicts. Our rights are eroded every day as people get arrested for the slightest expression of dissent, while thugs get free rein to spark chaos.

The government is blind to corruption while the Opposition doesn’t seem keen to change the system, only the players. Civil society, which we used to pin our hopes on to represent our voices for reform, turned partisan along the way and alienated many of us.

But NCC2 is not the answer. We don’t need yet another committee or task force making recommendations that will only end up in the bin.

We rely too much on politicians, prominent figures and movements to “save Malaysia”, failing to realise our immense powers as ordinary citizens to change the system.

In my story on how a block of low-cost flats in Petaling Jaya became liveable, the Desa Mentari Block 3 residents (mostly Malay and Indian) showed me how they overcame their differences and built a tight-knit community, akin to a kampung.

They enjoy a crime-free environment and the feeling of safety, which is something even I don’t have in my upper middle-class neighbourhood of Taman Tun. They did it on their own, without any big-shot politician or NGO leader. Their MP Wong Chen (pic) told me that he just let them run things the way they saw fit.

Malaysia may be falling to pieces, but we can’t push our individual and collective responsibility to fix the country to someone else. We have to stop standing behind those who do all the speaking up and summon up the courage to stand with them.

It’s not that Malaysia needs saving. If the country is messed up, it’s because we are, too. We’re content with letting someone else do the fighting.

Even with all the corruption going on, the most that we do is make snarky jokes on social media, the kinds that are outwardly funny, but with underlying tones of depression and helplessness.

We aren’t angry enough, which means we don’t care enough, to go out to the streets ourselves in droves and demand change regardless of the consequences.

A friend told me that one of the root problems is that Malaysia as a whole lacks an identity, compared to Sabah for example.

I think that we Malaysians do have one; we just haven’t found a way to articulate it. We want Malaysia to be a kind of “Promised Land” of racial diversity with a “Muhibbah” spirit, where we can point to others across race and be proud to say that ”they” are one of us. We want a reason to stay instead of emigrating to developed countries or even just down south.

But we sometimes let our insecurities get the better of us and when the going gets tough, we give up and ask other people to do the fighting for us. We need to stop doing that.

7 thoughts on “NCC2–Another Committee won’t do it”

NCC2 is an elitist concept by the top 0.001% of folks who’ll lose the most should Malusia shatter and laid to waste. Those who push for it happen to be mainstream apologists who can’t tell the difference between fasting and starvation.

The Camel in the room is not that Malaysians lack identity, but their identity has been ‘apartheidized’ as a political expediency.

The aforementioned problems of endemic corruption. cronyism, breakdown of Law+Enforcement, racist-religious fascism and so on, are signs and symptoms of a dysfunctional Leadership and Political Opportunism.

For all it’s worth, the fractious Opposition engenders as much opprobrium as the Establishment. Political FUBARism should be dealt with politically. No?

So who or what is this upper middle class journo blaming? Our so-called pathetic cowardice and inbred apathy? Yeah.., that like saying that we should all be born with a third nipple.

If all fails, only then can a revolution or rebellion take place. We are not yet at the tipping point, when the True Sons are still rent seeking and monopolizing galore.

The emnity of the people and country is Umno Baru and its leaders culture of MACCP . It had been disrupting or disenablying the whole delivery system (from 1982 Rm 2.5m BMF Loan Loss, the Twisted Judiciary, the broken promises of ABC,NEP , Bangsa Malaysia, through the countless Scandals, including the Rm 15 b BNM Forex Loss and the ” disappearancee ” of Rm 42 b Involving 1MDB) that is the core issue that had brought the country to this dire state of affairs.

It needed to be addressed and overcome soonest.
Clearly, NCC2 will not make that happen, because it is just
another manufactured piece of distraction from the core issues of the country.

The quantity of political leaders,from both, the ruling Umno Baru and oppositions,dominately are the problems,so are we,the people.
We let them !
We need to top letting them by all means, through the ballet box.

Thanks for the paradoxical thinking. I think you are right in that it might be useful in dealing with perception of race/religion, which has a psychological aspect that was never addressed.

In some sense, I guess I came to Christianity partly due to paradoxical thinking, as I found the logic to suggest that there is no God is as base-less a thought process as when assuming there is a God, as I found myself wanting to prove that God does not exist. I wanted to push away those ‘damn’ theists around me then, and at the same time wanted a way to stop my own unsettling feelings towards the ‘damn’ system.

Ms Boo’s writings caught my attention 2 years ago with this article that she mentioned she found freedom to think, by putting aside the faith that has helped her through difficult loss of her father in her teens.
//http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/boo-su-lyn/article/why-i-left-the-faith

In some sense, she has already been applying paradoxical thinking to herself and her target audience, which is middle class English educated urbanites.

In that sense, I think you have boo-boo’ed her attempt to do so too easily. I have been trying to do this katasayang stint close to a decade. My first post was a contentless subject header of ‘one hand clapping’. Until now, I found myself I have been able to convince no-one but my own mind. I am still doing a one-hand-clapping stint. I see in no near future ‘Handsome Jonah’ would see the light of what I am trying to tell him. I doubt rightways would ever care about my wrong way.

// we Malaysians do have one; we just haven’t found a way to articulate it. We want Malaysia to be a kind of “Promised Land” of racial diversity with a “Muhibbah” spirit, where we can point to others across race and be proud to say that ”they” are one of us. We want a reason to stay instead of emigrating to developed countries or even just down south.

On the above, I suspect there isn’t a way. Thus, lie the layu-layu-ism. There is no way out for this Tanah Melayu. It is cursed, unless more is willing to be exposed to the mentioned ‘paradoxical thinking’ exercise. Yes, I am already applying ‘paradoxical thinking’ exercise on whoever reading this now. Until you came to realize that there is no way out of layu-layu-ism, you would indeed be cursed to layu-layu.

The government will form another committee to study the need for NCC2 who will forward the recommendations to MO1. MO1 will then form a committee to review the need for NCC2 and more committees will be formed and so on and so on.

Dear Layusian,
Paradoxical thinking is a psychological tool to change not only superficial ‘perceptions’ but also deep seated anger, angst and hatred. It relies on reinforcing the prejudices and presumptions to the level of absurdity. It requires minimal psychological tools and is highly effective in the short term in areas of conflict – and unless there is a better ‘alternative’ available, absurdity soon becomes self defeating. Therefore it’s use must be carefully monitored and reinforced.

Unfortunately, Malusian politicos are generally too stupid and uninformed to be able to carry it out. They prefer didactic or confrontational rhetoric and polemics.

True religious faith cannot rely solely on absurdity, even though Christianity itself is counter-intuitive. That is why folks easily lapse and lose their ‘religion’. That is why we say Faith, Hope and Love is a Grace of God, besides the other Christian virtues and ‘gifts’. It goes for all religions, who pride themselves as ‘True’. Faith is of the psyche and ‘spirit’, not of the body.

It used to be Filipina uni graduates working as maids overseas, and perhaps still do.

Now we have our very own made-in-Malaysia electronic engineering graduate selling nasi lemak by the roadside.

This is just a step away from our Malaysian girls, graduates or not, working as maids overseas. However, ours would not be as marketable as the Pinoys who speak passable English and eat pork.

Coming back to the graduate nasi lemak “entrepreneur”, (using our PM’s term to describe her), it was not so sickening until she sold 1000 packets per day after she was “exposed” during the BAJET speech, (previously about 300 average), and actually thanked Najib for the sudden upsurge in business. No guessing who she will vote for in GE14. She is applying for a hawker licence and so may actually make a career out of it.

It used to be only students with exemplary academic results got to do science degree courses.

The writing is now definitely on the wall which phrase was of Aramaic origin….’mene mene tekel upharsin’, the interpreted meaning is,

God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it.
Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.
Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.

If Najib had wanted to showcase anything meaningful like economic resilience of the Malay community in these hard times, (which will get harder), why not the thousands of widowed or divorced Malay women throughout the length and breath of Malaysia who sell nasi lemak to feed a few kids.

At one fell swoop, the PM has highlighted two things, probably more:

1. the deterioration of the present national educational system;

2. the imminent danger of the economy collapsing.

#2 can only be rescued by reversing #1, and since #1 has itself already deteriorated beyond rescue, #2 will happen which would contribute to a further deterioration of #1 which will feed the collapse of #2 which will……………

A March 2016 email published by WikiLeaks reveals that George Soros, in anticipation of a meeting with Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, requested Podesta read a memo titled – “The TPP and Malaysia’s Corruption Crisis” – which argues that President Obama has wrongfully chosen to befriend and support the Government of Malaysia under Prime Minister Najib Razak.

The memo, authored by John Pang – a board member at Soros’ Open Society Foundation and a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Singapore – said that Najib is “a poster boy for the 21st century kleptocracy” who has used “a racial supremacist ideology that is collapsing under the weight of corruption” to perpetuate himself in power.

More importantly, the memo argues that PM Najib has created “a Malay-Islamic state in which Sunni Islam’s supremacy is indivisible from the political and legal supremacy of the Malay race, resulting in 1 in 10 Muslims had favorable views of ISIS and that a 53% majority were in favour of implementing Hudud, the Islamic penal code.”

On the subject of radicalization, the memo says Obama was naive because through Najib administration, Malaysia is a “net exporter” of militants to Indonesia and Mindanao. The government estimates that there are 50,000 ISIS sympathizers in Malaysia, including members of the military. At least 12% of Malaysian Muslims had favorable attitudes towards IS compared to 4% in Indonesia.

Soros also lectured Obama on Najib’s corruption, quoting Mr. Jose Ugaz, chairman of Transparency International (TI), who has singled out … as a prime example of national leaders in developing countries who have “become so corrupt that they endanger both citizens and society.” When Ugaz delivered his speech in Malaysia last September, PM Najib had chosen to go into hiding.

Through the memo, John Podesta was made to understand that George Soros knew about the explosive 1MDB scandal, and how the Malaysian prime minister had replaced the Attorney-General unlawfully, removed the lead investigators and intimidated the leadership of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission and the Central Bank.”